Report: Racist, sexist comments led to firing of juvenile justice services boss

The former head of Clark County Juvenile Justice Services used racial epithets to describe youth offenders while he perpetuated an unprofessional atmosphere around his employees, a recently obtained report found.

John “Jack” Martin, who was fired late last year, allegedly referenced the film “Django Unchained,” about a tortured slave, when discussing a recording that showed a Black youth offender being restrained by officers in 2018.

“We call that Django Unchained over here,” Martin allegedly told colleagues, according to the 21-page report completed in August.

The allegation was one of several probed by a law firm hired by Clark County to investigate the department. The accusations were outlined in a report obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal through a public records request.

Littler Mendelson P.C. attorney Wendy Krincek prepared the report.

In the report, Martin rejected the notion that his comments were racist, instead saying that he was comparing the “brutality” of the film with what he saw on the video of the incident.

Martin told the investigator that someone had brought up the comparison before him.

“Mr. Martin also commented that if someone perceives that as racist, he would want to have a clarifying conversation,” the report said.

Martin was fired two weeks after the investigation was completed, county spokesman Jennifer Cooper said Thursday.

Martin told a reporter that he hadn’t seen the report, and declined an offer to send him a copy.

“It was my great honor to serve the people of Clark County and work alongside some of the greatest Juvenile Probation Officers in the country,” Martin later wrote in a text message. “We, as a team did some incredible work diverting youth from formal system involvement. I look forward to the progress that they continue to make in the process of saving our youth from negative system involvement.”

Deputy Manager Abigail Frierson took over the department while the county hires Martin’s replacement.

The county recently launched a nationwide recruitment effort to find a new director, Cooper said.

Martin used to lead a department with three branches: detention, probation and the Spring Mountain Youth Camp, a facility that houses a yearly average of 240 male offenders ages 12 to 18, according to the county. There, the children are afforded “therapeutic, educational, social, medical and recreational needs.”

‘Sheer number of allegations’

The investigation was triggered by a late-March county commission meeting in which probation staff laid out allegations of intimidation, retaliation, nepotism, wrongful discipline and terminations by their department’s leadership.

Early last year, the unions that represent probation officers and their supervisors announced votes of no confidence against the department head.

The county manager’s office soon tapped Littler Mendelson to investigate allegations of unprofessional, disrespectful and “potentially harassing conduct” within the department, according to the report.

Forty-five current and former employees came forward with complaints, according to the report.

“The issue appeared to be quite serious and reflected a common theme amongst the complaints received,” the report stated.

Krincek wrote that not all the allegations the firm probed, some of which date back five years, were included in the report.

Racist language allegations

Martin was investigated for using the terms “Pookie and Ray Ray” when referring to youth offenders of color, the report said. He admitted using the words, but denied he did so with racial animus.

“Mr. Martin claimed the use of ‘Pookie and Ray Ray’ signifies only a juvenile who has gotten in trouble without any racial connotation and that he knows as many Pookies that are Hispanic or White,” the report said. “Mr. Martin was asked if it would surprise him if Black employees that have heard him use that term consider it to be racist. Mr. Martin stated that it wouldn’t surprise him, but he believes it is being taken out of context.”

The investigation also substantiated an allegation that Martin allegedly used the word “Polack,” a derogatory term used to describe someone of Polish descent, when mentioning that a staffer had done something wrong at a detention facility, the report said. He denied using the word.

Martin was also accused of using the terms “here for the Black boys” and “here for the Black and Brown boys,” but the investigation found that he hadn’t meant harm because of the “over-representation of minority boys in the juvenile justice system.”

Other substantiated allegations

Littler Mendelson said Martin kept a chocolate resembling male genitalia that had been sent to his office in a common freezer for months, the report said.

“Mr. Martin indicated that rumors about the delivery had turned into a fish tale, so he would invite people to go to the freezer to see it for themselves,” the report said. Allegations that he made sexual comments while discussing the delivery could not be proven, the report said.

Martin was accused of commenting on the physical appearances of female employees, which the investigation found that “more likely than not” had been made.

At a county meeting, a female officer said that Martin brushed off her concerns about staying at the detention camp when it transitioned to 24/7 hours in 2019, allegedly implying that the staff were involved sexually “anyway.”

Martin denied the conversation, but the investigation determined that the comments “more likely than not occurred.”

Employees interviewed alleged a toxic and unprofessional environment at Martin’s office, in which the head of the department would speak in a negative, condescending and rude way about people.

“Based upon the totality of the circumstance,” an investigator wrote, “I find the allegation that Mr. Martin maintains an atmosphere in the Director’s Office that is unprofessional and not respectful to be substantiated.”

Martin was also accused of using vulgar terms to describe an employee and calling group of female county executives “Mean Girls,” a term derived from a movie by the same name about school girls who are bullies, the report said.

The name-calling allegations were substantiated, the report said.

He defended his “Mean Girls” comments by saying he only meant it to describe a “group of girls,” and that if that is perceived as offensive, he owed an apology.

During a meeting, Martin allegedly said he would shoot the next person that used the term “community safety” right after a female employee had done so, the report said. He said he had quipped that he would shoot himself, a counterclaim investigators didn’t believe.

UNLV ‘detention babies’ comment

In an effort to recruit future employees, Martin would speak at UNLV classes.

During a speaking engagement, attended by a family member of a probation officer, Martin allegedly brought up inter-department romantic relationships.

“I pay my PO’s $76,000 a year to hump each other and make detention babies,” Martin was reported as saying.

Martin admitted using “detention babies” but said his comments had been taken out of context through a “rumor mill.”

“Mr. Martin seemed to have no regard to the fact that someone having their child referred to as a ‘detention baby’ can take offense,” an investigator wrote in the report.

Questioned further, Martin told the investigator that the comment was probably offensive in retrospect.

Contact Ricardo Torres-Cortez at rtorres@reviewjournal.com.